Photoshop - tutorial on grunge brushes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrcFJSdg6Pg

That's Sam Puc's tutorial on the Quarantine Collection. :) VERY awesome to watch someone go through the steps. However, I wonder if those who aren't familiar with photoshop will get as much as I did. IF you get lost at any point of it, please let me know through comments and I will do a post on that step.

You will need to full size that, but I didn't catch her actions very well on some of them (like creating a new layer). In a previous photoshop post I've mentioned how to make a new layer, and add layer masks. I can update this post with those steps as well if you like.

1 - not sure where to get the overlays, and what they are doing with those. Will need to research that. I've never done much at all with grunge brushes and overlays period, I just have never tended to like the look. High school seniors though? They love the look.

2 - I am purchasing these, and will do a post of my working with these grunge brushes soon.

Remember, here is where you can purchase the brushes...

Photography/Photoshop that can help Orphans!

Sandy Puc, a truly awesome photographer, is currently quarantined in China. She has some amazing charity drives through her photography business, and founded a personal favorite Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep which helps parents of stillborn children capture photographic memories (100% donated services from local photographers). If you click on Quarantined in China you will be taken her blog, which links to the Denver Post article that has a link to her Facebook photos (which are public). :)

Anyway, while quarantined in China (Shanghai to be exact) she has taken photos of the "grunge" in her hotel room and created "Grunge textures" to be used as layers in photoshop for grunging up photos. Click here for direct link to the grunge brushes BTW, the samples of the grunge brushes in action on that site are of her daughter in Quarantine. The session was a challenge for the Mom I've heard without all the extra equipment she typically has on hand for taking indoor photos.

100% of proceeds from the sell of this set of brushes is going to help Chinese orphans through a charity that works with them. I have asked which one, and will update when I know.

If you don't know how to use these brushes, please let me know and I will do a quick photoshop tutorial on them. It's super easy, and many photographers use them in a layer above the image and play with opacity and such. It's really easy. :)

Photos from last weekend

Katie LOVES to float around the pool.


JM was not allowed in the pool on this day (long story for another time), and he wasn't thrilled about it. But he survived. Notice the RAIN drops in this photo? How cool!

Then...the entire series of Samuel jumping....he didn't stop and he LOVED every minute of playing in the pool.










Okay, so this is a COOL series right? Only you wonder how in the heck did I click the shutter that many times?! I didn't. I pushed it once and held it down until the camera stopped, or Samuel was in the water. On most cameras you have a "burst" mode as an option in "shutter drive" - single shot is one box, the stop watch is the self-timer, and then there is another option of MULTIPLE boxes stacked on top of each other. That is burst mode, and the number of frames per second is totally dependent on your particular camera. My sister's new point and shoot will do about 3-5, the 30d that I was shooting with will do 7-9. The 5d? something like 3 if I'm lucky.

Each camera is designed for a different purpose. This is why I can't recommend a particular dSLR or camera to any one person without knowing what they want the camera for. It's just...well, so dependent on how you will be shooting. KWIM?

When do I use burst mode? Well, mostly during sporting events (or swimming). I've used it to capture my younger brother doing his crazy dives off the diving board (lots of fun), I use it during baseball games to capture the hitting of the ball (or the entire swing), and I've used it to capture my boys sliding on the slip and slide (will re-do that later this summer as well).

I do NOT use burst mode to capture portraits. It's overkill. It's for capturing the motion of actions. It ends up making a GREAT "flip" movie book, or a storyboard. ;)


NOW....for the photoshop portion. ;) Compare these two versions of the same photo. One is "batch processed" with my basic edits, the other I edited fully.



and before I get any criticisms about no one being right next to Katie....my BIL is a lifeguard and was in the pool and within quick reach of her at all times. Of the 3 kids in the pool, there were 8 adults around the pool. ;) 1 big kid sulking and wanting a chance to jump in, and one 3 year old who was REFUSING to even get on the steps.

Photography & Photoshop Friday

I'm showing you 100% straight out of the camera here....oh please don't run and hide.


Okay, this image was shot in Katie's bedroom with her in her crib (she had just woken up, and this is actually NOT a pout, but a "sniffing" of her nose which was slightly runny). Her bedroom window by the crib has sunlight streaming in it, but it's not hitting her directly. Notice the reflection in her eyes.

WHY is it pink? Well, the lights were off in her room and she has pink curtains hanging up that a lot of the sunlight was filtering through. I could have custom white balanced this and shot in jpg mode. It takes a few seconds to do, but as I shoot in raw I chose to not do that. If you open it up in a new window (right click on it), you will see that it's fairly in focus in the eyes but the crib behind her is out of focus (and really her ears are out of focus as well). It was shot slightly underexposed, but not too bad off (again in RAW format I can correct that).

So, I open in Adobe Camera RAW (Lightroom does similar, but I'm more familiar with ACR).


I adjust the color balance (the top two sliders on the right). I do this by playing with them until I get something that looks correct and "real life" to me. Then I adjust the exposure using the sliders below those top 2 - yes ALL those sliders fine tune the exposure for me. RIGHT CLICK and open in a new window/tab for closer viewing. :)

Isn't that MUCH better than "pink" pouty face girl?

closer photo of the ending sliders.


When I'm happy with those adjustments I open the image into Photoshop...

I look at the image at 100% - to see how much "noise" I am dealing with.


This one had more than I like, so I ran a filter I purchased - Noiseware.


Then I run a few actions I have bought or created or gathered. One is called "defog" and it's easy to create yourself. Open up the Unsharp Mask Filter, the settings are Amount 20%, Radius 60 pixels, Threshold 0. I use it on EVERY SINGLE PHOTO, thus I created an action that runs that setting. It basically removes the "fog" that is an artifact of every digital image, slightly sharpens the image. This image I also ran a 2nd action that gives layers for eye enhancement - on this one I sharpened and brightened her eyes bringing out the reflection of the window light.


Next I add a CURVES layer and a LEVELS layer - the Curves layer I play with the curve to get a slight S type curve (this one was backwards S. Levels layer I just play with it. Pay close attention so that you do not blow out the highlights and do not lose the details in the shadows. I give almost every single image both of these layers as well - with varying degrees of "opacity" applied.


I then go in and burn and dodge different areas to get the final effect I want...again it's a "playing" kind of thing. Both my burn and dodge tools are set to no more than 21% exposure on the midtones - thus I'm making TINY corrections. The key to great photoshop is tiny corrections that build on each other with very very "feathered" brushes.


My final editing step is to get to 200% magnification and fix all those little "blemishes" I see...such as nose issues, sleepy things in the face, or snot smears on the face.


Final product - with square crop because I felt it just called for it.

Friday Photoshop Fun!

We went this past week to visit the botanical garden, and the big dogwood tree that is blooming. I love dogwoods, and the reason why is there was a HUGE dogwood tree next to the house I basically grew up in. I would say it was close to the size of this one. I remember seeing it bloom every spring, getting my photo taken with it, etc. EVERY SPRING. Good memories. Anyway I had heard the trees were in "peak bloom" and I knew a BIG STORM was coming that night and it had been raining or cool most of the week. I took a chance and ran the kids out to the gardens to try and do just snapshots of them. When I post the boys you'll see what I mean. One day I'll go back with the reflector and other equipment and concentrate on "portrait" quality photos. Although I got a few of them that I like. :)



Knowing how slowly dogwoods grow, and how fragile in those early years, this one (and the one from my childhood) have to be VERY old.

But back to the photoshop portion of this post. I took a series of photos of Katie, close up. Here are 2 of them. To see any of these larger, right click and open in a new tab or window. Your photoshop may not look like mine. I use Adobe CS4, but if you use Adobe products many of the tools "look" similar, and I think all photoshop products have layers capabilities. If you are using something else, then your tools may look different but you should have the same ones.




Basic edits done to them, but both adorable...just not "quite right" to me. The one with the better "face" is missing one of the pigtails due to the wind. The one with both pigtails showing, the face while cute isn't "just right" either. What to do? Well...here's what I'm going to show you on this post. I first open both in photoshop.

Then I copy and paste the one with BOTH pigtails over the photo of the one missing one. I also copy the background layer of the photo with the one missing the pigtail. I have 3 layers now - background, background copy, and Layer1 (which is the photo of both pigtails). If you don't know how to copy the background, one way is to copy and paste it on itself.



YES, there are 3 layers there. I never make "permanent" changes to the original layer so that I can always go back to it and start over. :)



On the top layer (which is the one with the 2nd pigtail) I change the layer mode to DIFFERENCE to see what is "different" between the two. When things are aligned properly the image is all black. Using the move/change size tool (mine looks like and arrow/pointer with a plus sign beside it...it's at the TOP of the far left tool bar in this photo), I rotate and MOVE the photo until I get the nose and eyes aligned. Then I change the layer mode back to normal (and sometimes lower opacity) until I tweak what I want into "perfect" alignment.





On the top layer that is now properly aligned, I add a LAYER MASK. What is WHITE in the layer mask shows the layer it is on. What is black on the layer mask blocks what is on that layer and shows what is beneath it. (Don't worry, more to come on layer masks I promise.)



Then, to "hide" all of that top layer, I use the paint bucket tool and paint the entire layer mask BLACK. If you make a mistake and paint the entire "photo" area black then just undo and click on the WHITE layer mask box to make it the active portion of the layer.


Then, I select the brush tool with the layer box active, and "paint" white over the black where the missing pigtail is located until I have it all the way "back" in the photo but the rest of that layer is still "blocked"...

I typically will work on areas that I'm "bringing back" (also known as "moving") zoomed in, usually close to 100%. I've been known to go to 200% or 300% depending on the blending that needs to be done. This was easy as the background around it was "blurred" due to bokeh. I had a bit of trouble around the face, and I had to make sure the face lines in the photo matched up.

After I had the "pigtail" in the photo as I wanted, and didn't see any harsh lines or uneven "face lines" anywhere. I made sure I was still on the top layer, then I merged it down into the 2nd layer.

Notice, there is no more layer mask.

I'm now ready to do the edits I would do to "fix" it up for printing. This includes - sharpening, a curves layer, a levels layer, then I enhance the eyes (sharpen those a bit more, brighten them), and then I fix the "spots" on the photo that are distracting...such as the leftover food mess. ;) Then I crop how I want it printed (or leave it and crop in the ordering program).





Could I have done this in Lightroom? Not that I know of. Lightroom IS powerful though, and does some really cool things. However it is more of a "proofing solution" not a full editing program. Lightroom is where I do the basic edits - exposure corrections, color corrections, etc. Honestly, I do many of those in Adobe Bridge. Then I do the full edits in Photoshop. :)

Photo Friday

***This is NOT part of the series I'm working on, but for the few that actually know what I'm talking about, I added in the steps and the explanations. :)


This was taken with the 30d and 50mm lens open to 1.8 aperture. SS was 1/125. ISO 1600. I shot this in Manual mode. If you are coming from reading the ISO post above, notice the SS was 125 at ISO 1600. ISO 100 (which is where I told you to start) would have given me a SS of roughly 1/8th of a second. There is NO way I could ever hand hold that.

Here is the unedited, SOOC shot. *Oh this is hard*


WHY did I choose the settings I did?

1 - Why ISO 1600? I did not want to use flash. In fact, I rarely ever use flash indoors*. If I do use flash, I try to use it in such a way that you don't see it, which means NO shadows outlining people. I knew, given the time of day (evening around 6:30pm) and the fact that we only had the overhead lights on, I would need a fairly high ISO. *Exceptions are when I use the P&S camera

2 - Why the 50mm lens? I wanted to get close and I knew I would need to "open" up the aperture.

3 - Why f/1.8? I needed the camera as wide open as it would go (yes, I only invested in the $75 version of this lens. Why I did that is for a whole other post). I also wanted the bokeh (Japanese for blurry I believe) this lens provides at such wide open apertures. I knew, standing across the table from the kids painting that I could focus in on the hand and the body behind it would be out of focus, thus drawing attention to the hand painting.

4 - Why SS 1/125? The "duh" answer is that is the SS that gave me the proper exposure. But really, I need to elaborate on this for you. In all honesty, I could have gone with a SS of 1/60 and been fine hand holding as the lens is a 50mm. If I had done that I could have lowered the ISO to 800 and had less grain, or left it at 1600 and had an image that was over-exposed according to the meter by 1 full stop (and looking above 1 full stop would have been a wee bit too much, but not terribly too much).

Using a 50mm lens, I know that I need to keep my shutter speeds at LEAST longer than the lens length. In this case, I knew to combat my "shakiness" I needed to have a shutter speed of at least 1/50. However, for me, this night I had had too little or too much caffeine and knew I was a little shaky as I normally am. So a SS of 1/125 was close enough to double the lens length I strive for when I'm shaky, and it matched what I needed for the aperture.

Okay, had the proper exposure said I needed a SS of 1/30, I would have known I would probably see camera shake in the final image. It's just too slow to hand hold (especially for me). How could I have changed that SS? There are 2 ways. I could have "opened the aperture wider" and gone to f/1.4 and then my SS would have increased (the question is "to what?"). OR I could have bumped my ISO up to 3200 and increased the SS. There is a relationship between all 3, and you have to understand this to know how you can move the settings for proper exposure.

That's the "technical" behind the photo. Now, you notice, it's nice and pretty YELLOW tinted huh? I did not color balance this image at all prior to shooting. I shoot in RAW format, and this allows me to color correct after the fact (which is honestly a bad habit for me).

Here are my steps for Photoshop and processing my images, well the "basic" processing:

Open in Lightroom/Bridge/Camera Raw and adjust the color. I also adjust any exposure issues I see as well. This one was fairly good to start with, but I think I bumped the shadows slightly. I bumped the saturation levels a tad. Added a tiny bit of "fill light" or "brightness" as I probably should have slightly overexposed according to the in camera meter.

Then, I open in photoshop. I run an unsharp mask filter I have nicknamed "defog" and it basically takes the "fogginess" out of the original image. It slightly sharpens it.

Because I shot it at ISO 1600, I run a filter that takes out the excess noise caused by shooting at such a high ISO.

Then I run a curves action and levels action (boosting both of those). Curves boosts the highlights and colors while the levels boosts the shadows. I then adjust each of those layers to 50%.

For this image, I then cropped according to the rule of thirds - the paint tip is the "interesting" part so I put it on the bottom right 1/3. Think of your image, draw imaginary lines at the 1/3 intervals going both horizontal and vertical. Where they "intersect" are your "best points of interest" to make a photo more interesting.

We ended up with this:


Okay, open that edited version up in a new tab/window by right clicking on it and selecting "open in new". In cropping this one I actually sort of "failed" to get it into the rule of thirds. Why? If you notice, the paint tip brush is NOT in focus. The fingers holding it are in focus. More importantly the knuckles are in focus. Can you see where it falls "out of focus" at all? THAT is how shallow this depth of field is. I was standing about 3 feet away from the hand. If you are going to be standing that close to a child to shoot a photo of their face, then you have to be aware at how easily focus can fall off in the wrong spot. But in the small version, you just don't see the details enough to tell that the tip of the paint brush is so out of focus! ;)

I'll talk about Depth of Field in another post. :) It deserves it's own post.

*Yes, I know the edited version is showing a tad red....LOL yeah, a lot red. I have not gotten the CS4 set to the right colorspace, and this shows it! Off to fix that now.

Would you be interested?

As I know many of you out there in bloggy land got a new camera recently, with new lenses...and are attempting the Manual settings, would you be interested in a series of posts with photos showing the relationships between Aperture/SS/ISO in equivalent exposures? How they affect things.

A post or so on shooting wide open, on which lenses are good for what, etc.?

See, I'm studying right now for my CPP exam and I'm having to make sure I know this stuff forward and backward. REALLY FORWARD AND BACKWARD.

I can also run over some Photoshop techniques if you like as well, I do not know anything about Elements anymore, so I would need someone familiar with it and photoshop to help me out if you needed specific help with Elements. But I can explain/show why Unsharp Mask filters are good, why you should not just rely on one method for turning a photo to black and white, what a good curves and levels adjustment layers will do for you, and using MASKS.

I will need to go over all this soon for myself, and redo actions and redo workflows as I just upgraded to CS4 from CS2 and I know not all my plug-ins, actions, etc. will work.

What is the CPP exam? Click that and find out! :) It's TOUGH. Very tough. If I pass the written test, then I have to pass the image submission part.

I could not do any client photos here, but I can do the kids. :) Everyday life things, to portraits...

More photoshop

What exactly do I do? It all depends on the photo.

This one:

Again, adjusted the RAW image for exposure and color balance, ran my quickie actions (it's a slight sharpen, a curves adjustment, and a levels adjustment...oh and Noiseware/Portraiture to help smooth out the grain if there is any).

I take this image, and I "pick it apart" in my head. I do not like how bright the grass is. Not much I could do about that since I took it in full sun, which left Katie slightly underexposed in the SOOC shot. This image I adjusted exposure down slightly and brightened it. I do not care for how light the pink dress has become either. I also do not like that red dot in the background! LOL



So, what did I do exactly? I took out the curves and the levels, then I ran an action that is called V-Pop, which has a slight orange tint to it along with the curves pop (why I took out the basic curves and levels). I then adjust the opacity of it, use layer masks to mask out the grass (don't like it popped as it turned it too bright again). After running that, I ran another action that pushes up the "blues" in the photos and saturates them...at least that is what I think it does. After running that I again adjust opacity and use layer masks to mask the portions I do not want adjusted. Finally, I run a vignette action that I bought and love. It's fully adjustable on the shadows, midtones, and highlights...typically I only adjust the midtones, and then after it is done I use a layer mask. Surprise. When running the vignette, you have to REALLY watch out for "halo effect" around the subject. When I'm in a hurry, I often don't care. If I'm printing it, then I really pay attention to it.

OH, prior to running the V-Pop action I played with the eyes...sharpening the edges and brightening the irises.

This image, I did not like the full frame crop that I had in camera, and adjusted for a creative crop (many times I do not do this step for putting on the web). I like this crop, it's a 1::2 ratio.

Notice, the adjustments I made are MINOR ones. Each step is done on it's own layer, and the background image is rarely changed (it gets the basic defog, noiseware/portraiture, and sometimes further sharpening...but only in rare cases). As for that pesky red dot? I removed it on the background image. I used the patch tool and corrected it. Patch tool is great for the portions of an image where you do not have a lot of texture (or that texture is blurred). Not so great on things like hair, clothing, grass that is in focus...